While reading the Wall Street Journal review of journals by the English historian Hugh Trevor-Roper, I was struck by the following:
We learn in the “Wartime Journals” about the momentous day in Oxford when Trevor-Roper’s realization that he no longer needed to concern himself with metaphysics lifted a burden as surely as the mist rose from Christ Church meadow that morning . . .
Yes, exactly. The sentiment described strikes me a typifying what we’re up against. It’s not all that hard to imagine what a relief it is to decide that life has no meaning other than what we give to it. Nihilism lightens life nicely, and therein is it’s appeal in the present age.
March 15th, 2012 | 8:33 am
Nihilism lightens life nicely, and therein is it’s appeal in the present age.
Just so long as a man has food in his stomach, and money in his pocket. Just so long as he can narcotize that meaninglessness with bread and circuses. But once let misery into the picture. Impose on him suffering without respite, misery without hope, and he will crumble like a dry autumn leaf. The inability to answer the question “Why?” is only irrelevant until life forces a man to ask the question “Why?”
Atheism is a luxury purchased by the rich.
carl
March 15th, 2012 | 8:57 am
Some people will feel relieved to “find” that life has no meaning. Other people are completely crushed by it.
Nihilism is liberating to some and terrifying to others. As is atheism.
March 15th, 2012 | 11:13 am
“Atheism is a luxury purchased by the rich.”
carl
I like that statement. A lot.
March 15th, 2012 | 11:28 am
carl –
Y’know, it turns out there are atheists in foxholes.
March 15th, 2012 | 12:32 pm
Oh, and… “If you heard a marketer brag that he targets people who’ve been diagnosed with terminal illnesses because they’re easier targets, or a guy say he likes to cruise funerals because grieving women are easier to pick up, you’d think that person had no morals at all. But targeting people in moments of weakness to sell them religion is regarded as a normal and even virtuous strategy for proselytizing.” – Amanda Marcotte
March 15th, 2012 | 2:10 pm
An acquaintance of mine once praised Nietzche for providing people with “transcendence from the expectation of epistemic and metaphysical validation”, by which I think he meant that Nietzche excused people from having to provide coherent objective reasons for their beliefs and actions, and undermined the validity of aesthetic and moral judgments (a project continued by the New Left and the postmodernists).
Unlike my friend, I do not see this as a great intelllectual achievement.
March 15th, 2012 | 5:19 pm
If you heard a marketer brag that he targets people who’ve been diagnosed with terminal illnesses because they’re easier targets
then yes you probably would think he’s a predator, benefiting himself from others weaknesses.
If on the other hand someone “targets” people with terminal illnesses and offers them a palliative or cure, which they aren’t able to obtain themselves, at his own expense and possibly risk as well……….
March 15th, 2012 | 8:37 pm
Those horrible oncologists, targeting people who have been diagnosed with cancer, thinking they’re the people most receptive to what they have to offer…..
The post reminds me of the old Steve Taylor song, “Since I Gave Up Hope, I Feel a Lot Better.”
March 15th, 2012 | 10:08 pm
During my years in NY publishing, I encountered a number of people who — like the president — grew up with every possible privilege and opportunity that America can provide. Affluent parents (and grandparents); nice homes (including nice Manhattan apts provided by same); good schools; good colleges; J.P. Morgan bank accounts (min. required bal. — $25M) and yet… Miserable themselves, they also inflicted their misery on others. Not for nothing does Dennis Prager broadcast an hour each week on the mystery of happiness. And happiness for him includes the belief in, or at least the idea of, God. So I don’t know if I buy that rich atheists are content, or even gratified by not living with the economic anxiety that is now the norm for too many in America. Thanks to the misguided ideas and voting patterns of the well off.
Nihilism by the way is now mainstream. Martin Scorseses’ new film HUGO is co-produced by a company called, “Nihil Infinitum.” A children’s film. And in Clint Eastwood’s HEREAFTER, a young boy whose brother has died searches the internet for some way to make sense of it and even to contact his twin. At one point he sits in front of the screen shaking his head no, slowly and knowingly, as he watches a YouTube video of a British evangelist talking about Christ. He ends up with a psychic. He and his brother had been raising themselves and covering for their mother, a heroin addict; the foster care system is invariably humane and compassionate. The system works. And, to quote the Firesign Theatre; no “Christ-consciousness racket” in sight.
Then there’s Pullman’s (His Dark Materials series) bookstore and school readings of his books. Bringing his crusade against C.S. Lewis and Tolkien and God directly to the very young — and very ignorant.
Atheism evangelizes; atheism recruits. Children.
March 16th, 2012 | 9:29 am
pentamom – Those horrible oncologists, targeting people who have been diagnosed with cancer, thinking they’re the people most receptive to what they have to offer…..
Like these guys?
March 16th, 2012 | 9:33 am
Peter –
Just so we’re clear, here – religion cures terminal illness?
March 16th, 2012 | 9:37 am
Graham Combs –
Oh, atheism and nihilism are the same thing?
Is evangelizing children inherently wrong?
March 16th, 2012 | 11:18 am
I am really unclear about what nihilism is taken to mean in this discussion. Here’s the Merriam-Webster’s Unabridged Dictionary Definition:
It seems to me that anyone who really took this position would be forced into a kind of humility (and I believe Hugh Trevor-Roper was notoriously arrogant), since it would be necessary to acknowledge that one’s own beliefs and opinions had no more validity than anyone else’s. I don’t see how it is possible to be both a serious historian (or much of anything else) and a nihilist. But maybe I am misunderstanding how the word is being used.
Nihilism by the way is now mainstream. Martin Scorseses’ new film HUGO is co-produced by a company called, “Nihil Infinitum.” A children’s film.
I also don’t understand the point here. The production company (owned by Johnny Depp) is actually named Infinitum Nihil, not Nihil Infinitum. It is an allusion to a passage in Tolstoy’s A Confession: “In my reasonings I constantly compared (nor could I do otherwise) the finite with the finite, and the infinite with the infinite; but for that reason I reached the inevitable result: force is force, matter is matter, will is will, the infinite is the infinite, nothing is nothing – and that was all that could result.” Now, quite frankly, I don’t understand that, but I do know that Tolstoy was not a nihilist. So I am confused.
March 16th, 2012 | 11:00 pm
Oh, and… “If you heard a marketer brag that he targets people who’ve been diagnosed with terminal illnesses because they’re easier targets, or a guy say he likes to cruise funerals because grieving women are easier to pick up, you’d think that person had no morals at all. But targeting people in moments of weakness to sell them religion is regarded as a normal and even virtuous strategy for proselytizing.” – Amanda Marcotte
Yes, because we get 10% commission on every soul saved.
March 16th, 2012 | 11:04 pm
Just so we’re clear, here – religion cures terminal illness?
If you believe in Christianity, then you believe that converting someone is a good thing to do.
It’s similar to how a person who believes in scientism might “help” a friend (or offer comfort, at least) who is diagnosed with cancer by donating money to the research fund that looks for a cure.
But of course you are going to see a difference, because for some reason you assume that the Christian should be presumed to have ill motives (since your arguments make no sense unless you do start from that assumption, that somehow Christians try to share their beliefs because they “get something” – selfish – out of it)
March 18th, 2012 | 8:16 pm
No, Ray, like real ones. Meaning that targeting people with more dramatically noticed needs because they’re more likely to pay attention to the solution is neither uncaring nor unethical. What would be uncaring and unethical is knowing you have the cure, but not taking the opportunity to tell the guy who knows he needs it.
March 19th, 2012 | 9:06 am
Blake –
No, I’ve just seen a difference in practice. In that I’ve never – not once – seen any of the atheists of my acquaintance try to ‘deconvert’ anyone when they suffered serious illness or tragedy. I cannot make that statement the other way around.
But… they do. It says so in the guidebook.
March 19th, 2012 | 9:12 am
Pentamom – Real oncologists don’t tend to have a large advertising budget. Their ‘customers’ come to them.
Note that this is rather a side issue, though. The original claim was that atheists would
“crumble like a dry autumn leaf” under stress. Not only is it demonstrably not true, but nobody advises making major decisions under stress if it can possibly be avoided… because decisions made under stress tend to be, er, suboptimal.
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